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Tuesday, November 11, 2014

Right Brain vs Left Brain

I was reading an article about how the right brain performs certain functions, and the left brain specialized in other tasks. No, I haven't been living beneath a rock. I'm aware that this is common knowledge, and an accepted scientific fact. The right brain controls the left side of the body, and the left brain regulates the right side.

What about our ears?

Are they exactly the same?

Or do they hear things differently?

Scientists had long assumed that our ears were the same and that decoding sound took place entirely in the brain, with signals relayed in the appropriate side. According to Marilyn von Savant, we now know that auditory processing starts in the ear. For example, the right ear is geared more toward speech, and the left ear is attuned more to music. (Children with right-ear hearing impairment have more trouble in school than those with left-ear loss.) So if you are listening to music with a single earphone, you might want to put it in your left ear. But for learning a language, or listening to an audio book, it might help to keep the earphone in your right ear.